One of the “I thought it would never come” moments in the open source software industry would be audio and video support in Pidgin. Now it is here! Almost… Windows is not yet supported.

With the release of Pidgin 2.6.1. audio and video is finally supported in the xmpp protocol (used by GTalk). I have to say I haven’t tried it yet since my default IM client is now Empathy (already having audio and video support), which will be the default multi-protocol IM client for the Ubuntu 9.10 release.

The eco-system around Pidgin is fantastic, below is yet another cool plug-in tip for it.

Pidgin-Twitter plug-in works with Linux and Windows for you to get back into posting to and receiving notes from Twitter (also works well with Identi.ca too!). Steps to get it working:

1. download and install the plug-in the plug-in;
2. go to Pidgin menu under Tools > Plug-ins you’ll find Pidgin-Twitter to activate and configure;
3. place your username / password and define a couple of other options (such as show users’ avatars)
4. Add a buddy to your GTalk account called [email protected] and choose to display it even when it is offline.

You’re good to go! Open the chat window for the buddy you just created and instantly it’ll display your messages.

[Linux – Gnome Only] Listed on the roadmap to Gnome 2.24 is the integration with Empathy, a multi-protocol IM client. This integration could be a sign of a replacement for Pidgin and Ekiga with one single SIP and multi-protocol IM application.

For this article I tested Empathy to see how it works and if it is better or worse then Pidgin (currently my favorite IM client).

Installation:

I searched through Synaptic and was able to find Empathy and Telepathy so I installed from there. But, the version I found was really really outdated (I hate when that happens). So, after searching for some help information, I discovered this nice forum post that mentioned I had to add another Software Source to my Ubuntu:

Our favorite IM client has just gotten a really cool plug-in, Facebook chat for Pidgin. So now we can connect to 16 different IM protocols with Pidgin. Pretty cool, right?!

The plug-in itself comes in a pretty easy installer for Windows and Linux. Tested and works very well.

Pidgin is on a fast development track and just came out with their new version 2.4.1. There are several updates, such as:

• Add support for setting buddy icons on Gadu-Gadu (Tomasz Salacinski)
• Fix incorrectly marking some Yahoo! contacts as blocked
• Increase XMPP ping timeout to 120 seconds, to prevent poor network connections from timing out unnecessarily.
• Fix for displaying channel & buddy names in conversation window when they have ‘&’ in them
• Some memory leak fixes, especially in the Text Replacement plugin
• Rectangular but non-square buddy icons have rounded corners in the buddy list.
• And other crash fixes.

Download it now from the site.

After a week offline due to health reasons, we’re back! Apologies to our readers 🙂

Pidgin,  the milti-platform, multi-protocol, instant messaging client has released its version 2.4.0. There were several updates and bugfixes implemented, such as:

• Added support for offline messages for AIM accounts
• Support for Yahoo! Messenger 7.0+ file transfer method
• Input text area in conversation windows auto-resizes to fit more lines (up to a maximum of 4 lines)
• Typing notifications are now shown in the conversation area

For a list of the complete changes, please check the change log. Enjoy!

I’ve recently had to tweak two Windows computers because they were acting too sluggish. When I checked the processes running, I found several MS Live apps running and also when searching on the list of programs installed, there were several more MS programs installed. Microsoft really tries to push their products. Which is why I really don’t like to use their tools, even freewares.

aMSN is a MSN instant messaging client (aka Live Messenger) that you can install and run without noticing a difference from the proprietary original software. It works on Linux, Windows, and MacOS X. Although I use Pidgin for IM, I have aMSN installed in case I need to use a webcam or audio with someone on MSN.

Over the years I’ve created several email accounts and shared them with some friends and family to be in touch through Instant Messengers (IM). Being online for each account meant I had to open 4 different programs, each for one specific IM (AOL, MSN, Google Talk, Y!IM).

That was before all before I found Trillian, a proprietary program. It has a free version, I’ll give credit to that but the application was starting to slow down my computer a lot. That is when I switched to the open source Pidgin, formerly known as Gaim.